New Delhi, March 4: Knotting tight the bilateral ties, India and Bangladesh kick started their eighth edition of joint military exercise 'Sampriti', aiming to increase mutual cooperation, bonhomie and camaraderie between the armies of India and Bangladesh, began Sunday with an impressive ceremony.

The exercise, part of the ongoing India-Bangladesh defence cooperation, began on March 3 at the Bongobondhu Cantonment with an impressive opening ceremony is conducted at Tangail and will continue till March 15.

The Defence Ministry stated that a company group from Bangladesh Army and an equal number from Indian Army are taking part in the two-week long exercise that will see them hone their tactical and technical skills in countering insurgency, counter terrorism and aid to civil authorities for disaster management in an UN peace keeping scenario involving a combined deployment at a battalion level.

At the opening ceremony, the participating contingents marched in and stood side by side, and gave a ceremonial salute to the national flags of both the countries to the strains of Jana Gana Mana and the Amar Shonar Bangla.

"The aim of the exercise is to increase mutual cooperation, bonhomie and camaraderie between the two armies through interoperability and joint tactical exercises," the statement said. The Bangladesh contingent was represented by 36 East Bengal Battalion, while Indian side was represented by 9th Battalion the Rajputana Rifles.

In this eighth edition of the exercise, which started in 2009 as a platoon-level exercise and graduated to a company-level exercise in 2015 onwards, both sides will jointly train, plan and execute a series of well developed tactical drills for neutralisation of likely threats that may be encountered during simulated UN peace keeping operations, the statement said.